SECURITY chiefs fear an al-Qaeda cell funded by the British “White Widow” plotted to bomb a German railway station, The Sun can reveal. The attack in Bonn would have resulted in a massacre like the one in the Spanish capital Madrid in 2004 which left 191 people dead. But the device failed to explode and was disarmed before it could detonate. Intelligence sources in Germany say that al-Qaeda was behind the conspiracy — which encompassed “many operatives” overseas, including wanted Brit Samantha Lewthwaite. Last night a source said: “Remember this was a primed device that was of the size of...

The Syrian Air Force is again firing Scud missiles, this time to stem the general offensive Syrian opposition forces, including jihadis, launched Friday, Dec. 21, to capture the Syrian army’s military-industrial complex at al Safira and the big chemical and biological weapons store adjoining the facility. It is there, that Scud D missiles stand ready for launching, loaded with chemical weapons. Rebel forces are converging on Al Safira from the east, the west and the south. Among them are brigades of the Jabhat al-Nusra which the US has designated part of al Qaeda in Iraq. Military sources report extremely heavy...

A wave of biker gangs from the US, Canada and Australia arriving in Europe has raised fears of deadly turf battle like the Nordic biker wars of the 1990s, European police agency Europol warned on Friday. Gangs such as the Comancheros and Rebels from Australia, Rock Machine from Canada and the Mongols and Vagos from the US were moving into Europe. ... The gangs were seeking out particularly a dangerous hard core of recruits in their bid to seize territory to traffic drugs, weapons and people... The gangs "have a propensity to use extreme forms of violence", including with Kalashnikov...

More than 40,000 people have been slaughtered in Syria and the death toll rises daily. The European Union does not appear to be particularly concerned. North Korea's rulers have launched a three-stage rocket, moving closer to their goal of developing a nuclear-tipped ICBM, and they're sharing nuclear weapons technology with the world's leading sponsors of terrorism in Iran. The EU does not seem to be worrying about that, either. Israel is considering building homes on barren hills adjacent to Jerusalem. The EU's 27 foreign ministers said they were "deeply dismayed," and warned Israel of unspecified consequences if the plan is...

Israel's spate of settlement expansion around Jerusalem has increased again with the approval of 2,612 homes in a move likely to further inflame international criticism of Binyamin Netanyahu's government. Givat Hamatos, across the pre-1967 Green Line between southern Jerusalem and Bethlehem, will be the first new discrete settlement created since 1997. Critics say it will become part of a chain of settlements in the area, further impeding access between the two biblical cities. European diplomats in Jerusalem have warned that the construction of Givat Hamatos is a "game-changer" which could destroy the chance of a viable Palestinian state with East...

The German population could jump by 2.2 million people by 2017 as people make the trek from the south to Europe’s post powerful economy, researchers at the Kiel Economics have concluded. The researchers studied net migration to Germany over 50 years, and predicted that as euro-zone countries battle with their economic woes the relative strength and low unemployment rates of Germany will become an attractive lure. Germany is already a popular destination for young and skilled Greeks, Spaniard and Portuguese, who have grown disheartened with the high unemployment rates and struggling economies that have become hallmarks of their homelands. The...

Germany’s Angela Merkel and other center-right leaders have indicated they would like to see Mario Monti to keep on running Italy instead of Silvio Berlusconi. The center-right leaders—as well as the two Italian political adversaries—met in Brussels ahead of an EU summit on Thursday (13 December) in an event designed to prevent Italy’s political turmoil from stirring up the euro crisis once again. The center-right European People’s Party (EPP) chief Hans Martens admitted to journalists he stage-managed the whole thing so that neither Monti nor Berlusconi knew the other would be there until the last minute to make sure that...

Have our wishes been answered? Scientists have found an oil field which contains 200 times more hydrocarbons than there is water on the whole of the Earth. Time to wave peak oil goodbye forever … but before you do I should probably inform you of the tiny hiccup in any plan to develop this oil field. It is around 1,300 light years away. The scientists work at the Max Planck Institute in Germany, and using the 30m-telescope of the Institute for Radio Astronomy they discovered a vast cloud of hydrocarbons within the Horse Head Nebula galaxy in the Orion constellation.

The most sobering finding is that 46% of Turks say they hope that one day Germany will have more Muslims than Christians. Germans are overwhelmingly mistrustful of Islam and Muslim immigration, according to a new research survey, which concludes that the image of Islam in Germany is "devastating." The findings -- which corroborate the conclusions of other recent studies -- show a growing divide between ordinary Germans, who are concerned about the consequences of mass immigration from Muslim countries, and Germany's political elites, who are determined to build a "multicultural" society at any cost. The 28-page study, "Fear of the...

At a recent meeting of German business and foreign-policy leaders, one participant summed up an anxiety that’s almost palpable here: “Europeans have a sense of being left alone. You Americans don’t understand how much we need you.” Europeans seem relieved that Barack Obama won reelection. (One German official wrote in an informal paper that his victory was “the best thing that could have happened to the U.S.”) But Europeans remain worried that the Obama administration’s famous “pivot” toward Asia will leave them abandoned at a time of severe internal economic and political trouble. But a big idea is taking shape...

Most Americans remember December 7 as Pearl Harbor Day. But the seventh haunts many World War II Ranger veterans for another reason: It marks the anniversary of one of the great untold small-unit actions of World War II â€” the Battle of Hill 400, the U.S. Army Rangersâ€™ â€ślongest day.â€ť My new book, Dog Company: The Boys of Pointe du Hoc, chronicles that epic battle, as well as the other heroic efforts of this remarkable Ranger company.â€śFix bayonets!â€ť barked a hulking Ranger officer.In a scene reminiscent of a World War I battle, Germans and Americans stared at each other...

A joint German-Israeli government meeting in Berlin on Thursday (6 December) is likely to be the scene of more disagreements between Chancellor Angela Merkel and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu as the two traditional allies are having increased difficulty finding common ground. The scene was set already on the eve of the meeting. Netanyahu told Die Welt about his “disappointment” at Germany’s decision last week to abstain instead of saying “No” to Palestine's status upgrade within the United Nations. “I think Chancellor Merkel thought this vote would somehow promote peace. But the opposite has happened: Ever since the UN vote, the...

Germany's Duff Beer UG has shown itself to be a formidable foe in the courtroom, taking on all comers in defending its right to brew Homer Simpson's favorite beer. For what was originally a fictitious beverage fawned over by a yellow cartoon character with four fingers, Duff Beer and its would-be real-life producers have spent a surprising amount of time in court. And on Thursday, yet another such legal tiff was resolved -- with Germany's Federal Court of Justice (BGH) essentially ruling that the country can have two separate beers named Duff. Duff Beer UG, which has brewed the stuff...

Enrico Fermi This week marks the 70th anniversary of a turning point in human history.It was on December 2, 1942, that Enrico Fermi ordered the control rods pulled from the nuclear reactor he had built under the west stands of the University of Chicagoâ€™s Stagg Field stadium, thereby initiating the first artificial sustained-fission reaction in human history. A cryptic message flashed the electrifying news back to Washington. â€śThe Italian navigator has landed in the new world.â€ťThe consequences of Fermiâ€™s success were profound. Within two and a half years, the Manhattan Project advanced to build both uranium-isotope-separation and plutonium-manufacturing facilities on...

East Germany's secret police sold citizens to western pharmaceutical companies to use as human guinea pigs in drug trials • Tens of thousands tested with experimental drugs not approved in the West • One study of a drug for heart conditions saw six out of 17 patients die • Sinister practice exposed in disturbing new Germany documentary Former Communist East Germany secretly sold its citizens to western pharmaceutical companies to use as human guinea pigs in drug trials. Tens of thousands of sick people in the former German Democratic Republic were treated with medicines not approved in the West to...

Germany used to be extremely careful about where it exported its weapons. In recent years, however, Chancellor Angela Merkel has shown a preference for sending high-tech armaments abroad rather than German soldiers—even if that means doing business with questionable regimes. … German high-tech weapons are a hot commodity among Arab potentates and other autocrats. They haven’t failed to notice that the coalition government of Chancellor Angela Merkel’s center-right Christian Democratic Union (CDU) and the pro-business Free Democratic Party (FDP) has steadily relaxed Germany's otherwise restrictive arms export policy. … The chancellor points out that her foreign policy is “committed to...

Germany said Monday it was “deeply concerned” about Israeli plans for new settlements but would not "for the moment" summon its ambassador to Berlin. Ahead of talks this week between Chancellor Angela Merkel and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, German government spokesman Steffen Seibert called on Israel to withdraw its plan to build new Jewish settler homes. … When asked whether Germany would follow France and Britain in summoning the Israel ambassador, a foreign ministry spokesman said Berlin had no immediate plans to do so. …

Now it’s Europe’s turn to worry about U.S. economy. American officials have been wringing their hands for the past two years about the heavy burden of government debt piling up in Europe. On Tuesday, Europe’s Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development warned that the U.S. "fiscal cliff" threatens prospects for the eurozone’s economic recovery. “We’re talking here about the medium and long-term viability of the United States economy,” OECD Secretary General Angel Gurria told CNBC. “Not only to avoid the fiscal cliff but then get to a moment where (U.S.) debt stops rising and the debt to GDP starts coming...

Germany is about to ban sex with animals, including the 'pimping' of farm animals for sex. Source: Herald Sun THE German government is about to reintroduce a ban on bestiality, after pressure from animal welfare groups. Newspaper die Tageszeitung reports that the governing coalition are soon to amend the country's Animal Welfare Act to make sex with animals punishable with a fine of up to 25,000 euros ($31,000). Bestiality was legalised in Germany in 1969, the same year that gay sex was also removed from the criminal code. After that, sex with animals was only punishable if the animal was...

man claims he was nearly killed after his girlfriend choked him with her large breasts, according court proceedings. A high-flying lawyer fled in terror naked after his girlfriend used her 38DD breasts to kill him, a German court has heard.Tim Schmidt, 30, said his girlfriend, Franziska Hansen, 33, mounted her assault while they were having sex because she was jealous of his successful career.

Soeren Kern, writing for the Gatestone Institute in his November 16th article, "IslamNeeds a Fair Chance in Germany," reported a significant development in Germany that portends dire consequences for that benighted nation and for all of Europe: the city of Hamburg signed a "treaty" with organizations representing its Islamic population. The "treaty" features a series of concessions, not by the Muslims to secular authority, but by the secular government of Hamburg to the Muslims. The "treaty," which requires ratification by the city's Parliament, grants Muslims "rights" and "privileges" enjoyed by no other religious group there. The November 13 agreement, signed...

Wednesday morning, August 27, between 11 am and 1:30 pm EST or 9 am and 11:30 am mountain time, I'll be chairing a New America Foundation/Middle East Task Force event in Denver at the Colorado History Museum. The keynotes are Senator JOHN KERRY (D-MA), Obama National Security Adviser GREG CRAIG, Princeton University Woodrow Wilson School Dean ANNE-MARIE SLAUGHTER, former Congressman and Obama Adviser MEL LEVINE, former German Foreign Minister JOSCHKA FISCHER, and Aspen Institute President (and former CNN Chairman and CEO and TIME Managing Editor) Walter Isaacson. Our panel will be former Israeli negotiator and New America Foundation Senior Fellow...

Germany has raised the pressure on British Prime Minister David Cameron to seek an agreement on the EU’s long-term budget at a summit in Brussels today (23 November), by floating an alternative deal that would sideline Britain and neutralize its veto. … If confirmed today, the “Plan B” would work in two steps. First, EU leaders, recognizing the impossibility of finding an agreement at 27, would issue a statement at today’s meeting saying budget talks will resume in January 2013, at another summit.In the meantime, they would reach a political agreement on the bloc’s long-term finances—without the UK—and confirm it...

David Cameron brandished a list of the “outrageous” pay and perks of tens of thousands of Eurocrats last night as he clashed with EU leaders over British demands for cuts to Brussels’ vast budget. The Prime Minister insisted tens of billions of pounds could easily be slashed from the EU’s spending plans for the next seven years. He highlighted the Brussels gravy train, a new EU diplomatic service and infrastructure investment as key targets. … The Commission wants to increase its budget by 350 percent—from Ł6.5 billion ($10.4 billion) to Ł29 billion ($46 billion). Britain said that, at most, it...

Muslim officials will also be able to determine who will (and will not) be allowed to teach courses about Islam in city schools -- meaning that only Muslims will be allowed to teach Islam. Muslims, for their part, are hoping the Hamburg treaty will establish a precedent for the rest of Germany to follow.

German soldiers and missiles seem likely to be posted to Turkey’s border with Syria soon. One report suggested the government was checking the legality of such a posting, ahead of a Turkish request expected on Monday. The Süddeutsche Zeitung newspaper reported on Saturday that government officials were discussing whether a parliamentary mandate would be needed to send the 170 soldiers which would be needed to staff two Patriot missile units as part of a NATO mission. The Turkish government said ten days ago it wanted the air defence missiles for its border with Syria, where rockets from the civil-war-wracked country...

Fewer than a dozen European leaders have so far accepted an invitation to attend next month's Oslo ceremony to award the Nobel Peace Prize to the European Union, this year's controversial winner, the Nobel Institute said on Wednesday. "Between eight and 10 have said they would come and and somewhat fewer have responded in the negative," the director of the institute, Geir Lundestad, told AFP. After the unexpected awarding of the peace prize to a crisis-stricken EU on October 12th the bloc's President Herman Van Rompuy invited all the leaders of the 27 member states to attend the ceremony, which...

Forget about that dead parrot of a question – should we join the eurozone? The eurozone has officially joined us in a newly emerging international organisation: we are all now members of the Permanent No-growth Club. And the United States has just re-elected a president who seems determined to sign up too. No government in what used to be called “the free world” seems prepared to take the steps that can stop this inexorable decline. They are all busily telling their electorates that austerity is for other people (France), or that the piddling attempts they have made at it will...

French officials angrily rejected a charge by The Economist on Friday that France was the "time-bomb at the heart of Europe", accusing the magazine of sensationalist journalism. The Economist's front cover showed seven loaves of "baguette" bread held together by a French tricolour with a lit fuse protruding from the centre. Its main article raised concerns that President Francois Hollande's economic reforms are not ambitious enough and so could jeopardise the future of the euro currency. "Unless Mr Hollande shows that he is genuinely committed to changing the path his country has been on for the past 30 years, France...

Yesterday we posted the official statement of Bundesbank executive board member Carl-Ludwig Thiele, which in turn was a response to a recent surge in concerns about the safety and sanctity of German sovereign gold, held mostly abroad (if a major part of it held in London had been secretly repatriated), and demands by the general public - i.e., those who actually own the gold - for either an audit, or full repatriation, or both. There are, however, some problems with the official Bundesbank statement: the statistics cited in it, as well as the various explanations, are wrong, incorrect or...

(Reuters) - The euro zone debt crisis dragged the bloc into its second recession since 2009 in the third quarter despite modest growth in Germany and France, data showed on Thursday. The French and German economies both managed 0.2 percent growth in the July-to-September period but their resilience could not save the 17-nation bloc from contraction as the likes of The Netherlands, Spain, Italy and Austria shrank. Economic output in the euro zone fell 0.1 percent in the quarter, following a 0.2 percent drop in the second quarter. Those two quarters of contraction put the euro zone's 9.4 trillion euro...

The United States and Germany won a closely contested race Monday among western nations for UN Human Rights Council seats, while the likes of Venezuela and Pakistan secured places without a competitive vote. Rights groups condemned the “pre-cooked” arrangements by most continental groups at the 193-member UN General Assembly which gave council seats to countries whose records have been widely questioned. The United States, Germany and Ireland won the only open election among western nations. …

In early January 1943, the United States Third Army was assembled on the large terrace in front of Peover Hall near Knutsford, England. Before them stood a man in a tailored, brass-buttoned battle jacket with four rows of battle ribbons and decorations. On his legs were riding breeches and polished, high-topped boots with spurs. Around his waist was an old-fashioned leather belt with a large, shiny brass buckle, and he carried a long riding crop with a hidden sword in it. Fifteen stars in total were placed on his shirt collar, helmet and shoulders. "I've been given command of the...

Palestine can count on about 12 Yes votes by EU countries when it tries to upgrade its UN status, in a move expected later this month. … A senior EU diplomat told this website the Union remains divided on the question, however. He noted that member states’ votes “will probably follow the same pattern as with UNESCO,” referring to a decision by the UN’s Paris-based cultural wing to admit Palestine as a member last year. At the time, 11 countries—Austria, Belgium, Cyprus, Finland, France, Greece, Ireland, Luxembourg, Malta, Slovenia and Spain—backed Palestine’s UNESCO bid. Another 11—Bulgaria, Denmark, Estonia, Hungary, Italy,...

The European Commission and top German politicians are becoming increasingly exasperated with both France and Britain as the summit in Brussels to determine the EU budget for the seven-year period from 2014 to 2020 approaches. Both countries have been insistent on getting their way as member states position themselves for what promise to be difficult talks—and both London and Paris have threatened to veto the budget if it doesn't meet their expectations. In response, European Energy Commissioner Günther Oettinger, Germany's representative on the EU's executive body, has harshly criticized the two countries. …

There is hardly an issue about which Germans as so united as they are by their desire to see America on its knees. It unites both the left and the right. Wherever they look, they see decay, a lack of culture and ignorance. … The criticism of America has always been a bit infantile. One is familiar with the theory from psychoanalysis, when people talk about transference, or when suppressed feelings or emotions are overcome by projecting them onto others. … The childish excitement over Obama, that once again took hold over Germans during this election—fully 93 percent of the...

Calls for Germany to repatriate its 1,536 tons of gold reserves held at the NY Fed are intensifying as Der Spiegel reports the Federal Reserve has refused to allow German inspectors to even view the country’s massive gold reserves “in the interest of security and of the control process“. We have stated repeatedly that with repatriation and/or audit requests completed or in progress by Venezuela, Germany, Switzerland, and the Netherlands, The BOE and the Fed suddenly find themselves in a heap of trouble as the situation (and confidence that the Central banks actually still hold the tungsten gold reserves on...

The Bashar al-Assad rule in Syria has come under heavy fire from people who believe that the regime must quit over its atrocities. But any attempt by the US-led West to impose a replacement will backfire soon India’s oil-rich western neighbourhood, extending from the Arabian Sea to the Bosporus, is engulfed in conflicts arising from sectarian and civilisational rivalries, aggravated by the meddling of external powers. With an arsenal of over 100 nuclear weapons, Pakistan is today witnessing a period of internal strife, largely arising from the pernicious role of its military establishment and tensions across its disputed borders with...

The re-election of US President Barack Obama was widely reported Thursday in Germany under the headline "A Second Chance." That second chance, according to German commentators, would include the opportunity for Obama, without the fear of another re-election campaign, to take a stronger leadership role at home and abroad. … Several of the commentaries in major German newspapers took a pessimistic view of the prospect of breaking the gridlock in Washington between the administration and the Republican-controlled House of Representatives. But they also wrote that Obama should now use his post to more actively engage in the world, strengthening ties...

U.S. Election--my report from Germany If you're getting this mail from me, you may not be totally happy with the result of yesterday's election. Let me share what I experienced last night in Stuttgart, and this may be enlightening. Right now, we have more than four years of Obama's crew staring us in the face. Last night, I spoke (in German) on behalf of Republicans Abroad at the (State Parliament) Landtag in Stuttgart's US Election Night Party. It was a 90 minute podium discussion. In the crowd there were 800 ppl (German 2/3 and American 1/3) there with 798 of...

The sister of a Belgian Nazi leader hid three Jews in her home near Brussels during the Holocaust, according to one of the survivors. Hanna Nadel, now 86, said she, her mother and her niece were rescued by M. Cornet, the sister of Leon Degrelle, who, as leader of the Belgian Nazi Rexen movement, was responsible for deporting Jews to their deaths during the German occupation of Belgium. Nadel’s account, related to historian Jan Maes, appeared earlier this week in the Belgian-Jewish monthly Joods Actueel, The three, having escaped deportation orders, wandered with their suitcases around the town of Sint-Genesius...

PDF It almost goes unnoticed that the United States is closing a long chapter in its Atlantic history. For 70 years, since the landing in Normandy, America was literally a power-in-Europe, with a vast military presence stretching from Naples to Narvik and from Portugal to Germany. At its peak, the entire force, Navy and Air Force included, numbered 300,000. The Army topped out at 217,000. At the end of this year, the ground troops will have dwindled to 30,000. A massive support structure of American grand strategy is being dismantled. Why is no one weeping or gnashing teeth?That would...

Homeschoolers Flee Persecution in Germany and Sweden The New American 03 November 2012 This weekend the first ever Global Home Education conference is being held in Berlin as homeschool families tell of being forced to flee Germany and Sweden. Related Articles: German Statesman Backs Homeschooling, Slams State for “Usurping” Kids In Sweden, Persecuted Jewish Homeschoolers Win Court Battle Persecuted & Exiled Swedish Homeschoolers “Walk to Freedom,” Vow to Fight On Homeschool Leader Flees Swedish Persecution Sweden Bans Home-schooling, Religious Instruction State "Kidnapping" of Swedish Home-schooler Prompts International Outcry U.S. Judge Grants Asylum for Homeschooling Family Government Schools Are Bad for...

Troubled Deutsche Bank has rented out the whole of one of Germany’s poshest hotels—for its top managers to spend three days taking about cutting costs and saving money, a magazine reported at the weekend. Suites at Berlin’s Adlon Hotel can cost up to €15,000 ($19,239) a night, while the cheapest room will set penny-pinchers back €320 ($410) a night—and Deutsche Bank has rented out the entire building, Der Spiegel said, in a report to be published on Monday. …

Does Britain belong in the European Union? There are plenty both in the United Kingdom and on the Continent who have their doubts. Now, with the debate over the EU’s next budget raging, a European Commissioner has challenged London to decide. In Germany, Chancellor Angela Merkel is also losing her patience over the squabble. … On Friday, European Commissioner for Financial Programming and Budget Janusz Lewandowski, Poland’s representative in the EU’s executive, said it was time for Britain to make a fundamental decision regarding its future in the European Union. “Of course there are limits,” he said in an interview...

"German Islamists Target Youth on the Internet" By Christoph Sydow 11/01/2012 "Translated from the German by Christopher Sultan." PHOTO CAPTION: "A growing community of German-speaking Islamists has developed on the Internet. Aiming to find new recruits, they glorify jihad and call for attacks on Germany. A new study warns that such online propaganda might foster a new generation of terrorists." SNIPPET: "International terrorist groups like al-Qaida recognized the importance of the Internet for recruiting new supporters early on." SNIPPET: "Intelligence services can also take advantage of the anonymity of Internet forums to deliberately plant false information or obtain insider...

Thousands of German workers at Opel cars will lose their jobs in another round of cuts announced this week by the car maker’s owner General Motors. As many as 2,300 people have already been let go. … The company lost half a billion dollars in Europe alone in the third quarter, when it produced just 196,000 cars—down from 270,000 in the same quarter last year. …

CLEVELAND, OH - a Transportation Security Agent has been arrested on a warrant for the rape of a northeast Ohio boy he had been mentoring as a big brother. ... arrested at the airport in Newark, NJ. He had gone to work for the TSA in Germany

Two days ago we reported that the German Court of Auditors demanded that the German Central Bank, the Bundesbank, verify and audit its official gold holdings consisting of 3,396 tons, held mostly offshore, namely New York, London and Paris, at least according to official documents. It also called for repatriation of 150 tons in the next three years to perform a quality inspection of the tungsten gold. Today, in a surprising development, via the Telegraph we learn that none other than the same Bundesbank which is causing endless nightmares for all the other broke European nations due to its insistence...